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On Extending & Enhancing the 730
My Teaching & Delivery Context:-
I teach & assess on the City and Guilds 7307, 7306 and 7281/04/05 teacher training courses. Furthermore, I work with tutors in a number of disciplines at learning sites such as training centres, colleges and universities. Most of my students on the 7306 study at a training centre, whereas one 7306 student and all those on the 7307 study at university.
For 730 students I use Covey's principle from his 7 Habits, (1990) 'Seek first to understand, & then to be understood', I set out to help my students to understand themselves and their learning colleagues. These learning colleagues include both fellow students and their tutor(s).
The 7307 group I worked with were located at a training agency in Birmingham. The candidates aimed to teach in a number of disciplines The Local TEC funded the course for the clientelle who were on the dole under the Training For Work (TFW) programme. Other candidates were funded by their employers. These were mainly local authority employees who were hoping to qualify to train their fellow employees. The cash paying customers were, therefore, the TEC and local employers. The recipients of the training who were aiming at 7306 qualification were a mixed group of waged and unwaged people.
For my students, including those on the 7306, I used pre-programme questionnaires and one to one interviews to discover their learning needs. The results contributed to pre-programme rationales wherein I developed what was going to be taught at what pitch, with what resources and which particular approach. As Daines, Daines & Graham, (1993) say, It is incumbent upon you to to initiate some procedure whereby a group is empowered to undertake negotiation of some (or all) of the curriculum and of the course's (or session's) organisation & management. . . . Share some of the responsibility for the course with students; they will be more committed to making it work as a result.
Mentoring, Coaching & Interdependence.
I used a coaching and mentoring relationship with as many of my students as possible. The mentor role in particular was very helpful to their progression. I did not always take the mentor role with my own students, but sometimes through third persons. Some learners found it difficult to separate the teacher from the mentor. As Rene Carayol said, Mentoring is all about people 每 it's about caring, about relationships and sensitivity. Time constraints and peoples' different personal makeup mean that some do not wish to partake of such a relationship. In developing the mentoring relationship I aim to inculcate a view of learning that is like a mobius strip or double loop. In this, I concur with Charles Handy (1996) that, Learning is a double loop. . . there is learning to solve a particular problem and then, more importantly, there is the habit of learning, the learning to do such things, that second loop can change the way you live. This is in the hope that my learners will 'catch the bug' of life long learning. This predominately romantic model is the curriculum I feel most at ease with as, 'It is more concerned with processes (living attitudes & values), and experience (real life topics, projects, simulations) whose main method requires the active involvement of the learner in the learner experience. The implicit values are that the students co-operate with each other, and learning is evaluated by self assessment and levels of personal satisfaction.' With learning delivery I always, as Covey says, (1992) 'begin with the end in mind.'
Like Covey, I aimed at interdependence between my learners so that they coached and mentored each other rather than compete. Some, who had been used to a secondary school culture where sharing learning is called 'copying' and is seen as cheating, have, through various exercises in a learning colleagues group / set have been surprised to find how effective this learner led coaching / mentoring relationship is. Learning becomes more enjoyable. Learners cease to feel so isolated. They discovered how others learn and relaxed into this easier to live with learning ecology. My students became partners in learning. Although this approach can be time consuming, my work load was lessened because the learners became fellow teaching colleagues working together with me in the sharing of learning with the whole group.
Methodology
I use an experiential learning methodology. It has been noted that, The fracture between experience and learning encourages a strong tendency to reduce learning to little more than memorisation. . . . Work experience . . . is now widespread albeit at the cost of enormous energy on the part of the teachers setting it up. . . . These are more effective learning situations. . . When learning facts by memory was a relevant educational activity . . . experiential learning looked dopey. There is now much 'hard headed' support for it. . . Steinaker & Bell (1979) argue that the existing taxonomies of cognitive, affective and psychomotor learning are inadequate in that they concentrate on only one element in the way that learners experience learning. The experiential taxonomy was intended to synthesise the other domains of learning. . . . There seems to be no reason why the taxonomy could not be used with a more overt humanistic slant, with learners given more responsibility from the outset and encouraged to work in groups.
Using the types of materials in Appendix 1, I aimed to help my students discover their:-.
↙ Strengths and weaknesses.
↙ Degree of motivation.
↙ Commonality with other students.
↙ Paradigm conceptions (how I / they trigger ideas / how I / they think).
↙ Perception (how left /right brain works).
↙ Own & others learning styles.
↙ Ability to learn new learning styles by set membership.
These materials were influenced by ideas from various sources including a self analysis questionaire aimed at effective set membersip via a version of Belbin's Psychometric Test . I gained much from Kolb & Wolfe's Individual Learning Styles (LSI or Learning Style Inventory). These are in addition to the works noted in the bibliography at the end of this assignment.
I believe the 7306 would be enhanced by the inclusion of learning sets wherein students proactively work and rehearse with each other outside the classroom. I believe that the kinds of materials in appendix 1 should be used concurrently with evaluation / monitoring instruments like the ones in appendix 2 and those found in 53 Interesting Ways to Appraise Your Teaching (1988). Together with the tutor as consultant, I believe that this approach would make the 730 more effective for its customers.
Purpose, Customers, Content & Outcome
Who and what are the 730's : -
1. Purpose(s)?
2. Customers?
3. Content?
4. Outcome(s)?
5. Next Step(s)?
Can it be re-engineered? No, because as James Champy says (1996) it is not possible to re-engineer an isolated process. One would have to include the whole adult education framework and the philosophy underpinning its purpose and practice. Again, for re-engineering, it is mandatory to have an executive leader with the authority to make changes in current practice and have power to experiment with pilot scheme(s). This person would have the prerogatives to authorise spending on costs involved in funding materials and personnel.
1 Purpose ReGenesis?
The purpose of the 730, as I have observed and gleaned and practiced, is to give a foundation of theory and practice to teachers involved in 16+ education.
If this was a completely new project where I had to design what is now the 730 (re-genesis), would I design it in the way it presently is?
Perhaps, considering the way the current 730 looks, a project brief might look like this.
Project Mission:
A) Design methods for imparting the requisite skills with commensurate underpinning knowledge & theories for adults to teach and train other adults in various disciplines, (usually in groups rather than distance or solo learning). This means that the person so taught will receive a nationally recognised qualification to teach in F.E institutions a after demonstrating their abilities so to teach.
B) These qualified teachers will then be on a pathway to further : i) General courses that will enhance their skill and theory base so that their delivery abilities are improved and updated. ii) Specialist courses in their particular teaching arena. The contents of both of these enhancements will be determined by the requirements of the market. The teachers so enhanced will receive nationally recognised higher qualifications to teach in both F. & H. E. institutions b after demonstration of enhanced knowledge and skills.
C) By these means develop a series of lifelong learning multi-dimensional pathways for the growth and enhancement of these teachers. Details follow.
These might be the opening gamut of such a project brief.
Monitoring
It is usual for a project to have a mechanism for monitoring progress. This will monitor achievement of objectives and oversee cost/time budgets. It will usually be invested in persons who form a committee of interested parties who represent relevant organisations. The project manager reports to this committee. this committee has ultimate power over the direction the project takes within its prescribed parameters.
My Experience of Monitoring
Part of my role in the delivery of the 7306 was as intenal verifier working within the parameters of City & Guilds D34 criteria. The checks & balances of the NVQ system are: The Assessor who checks the work of the candidates to ensure agreement with criteria. The Internal Verifier who double checks the work of the assessor within the learning organisation and the External Verifier who works for the awarding body and double checks the quality of the work of the former two officials. At this training agency I was given the task of rechecking 7306 portfolios that had already been passed. When tested against the awarding body's criteria they manifestly did not meet them. Though I felt that I was 'rocking the boat' I produced a detailed report on these portfolios, one of which did not meet more than half the criteria. (See attached memo 每 the names have been changed to ensure confidentiality)
I gained my 730 in the mid eighties. Since then, I have taught in commercial businesses, training agencies, LEA colleges and universities. I have never been subjected to monitoring in programme delivery
This lack of monitoring of the effectiveness of teachers at the training agency where I recently worked resulted, I believe, in the demise of that agency.
When I ran my own company I ensured that all my training staff were regularly appraised and their work evaluated. Without effective monitoring and measurement, we do not know how we are doing and have no reason to change, develop and improve our delivery.
Taught or Facilitated?
Ian Reece & Stephen Walker (1994) , say in the introduction of their book that the teacher is a facilitator rather than an imparter of knowledge.
They go on to say that this means that the students place themselves in the hands of the teacher and that this tends toward dependency rather than liberation for the student.
In the Dictionary of English Etymology, (1993) , a facilitator is defined as one who makes things easier for those in receipt of the facilitator's services. The word's root comes from the Latin word, facilis, that is, do-able. Thus the teacher / facilitator is one who makes things 'do-able' for the student.
The skills required for the disassembly of tasks, information, processes of thought together with the underlying philosophies into do-able parts in preparation for delivery to students are a major part of my work as such a facilitator / tutor. Furthermore the deus ex machinae, the spirit of the delivery machinery, the love of the work and care for the students need to be imparted. This coloured how I prepared the means of delivery. This is in addition to the use of audio visual tools together with techniques of demonstration, exercises, plus attitudes and choice of teaching paradigm. These are in constant flux as their inadequacies are highlighted by my different encounters with various groups of students.
As a teacher I must a priori be involved in lifelong learning in order to design freshly relevant paradigms that will prove to be effective as facilitating measures for each new encounter with students. The development of lifelong learning will create commensurate lifelong research and development to find the best that can be found to develop the best and most effective paradigm for my students, 7306 and others.
Effective Evaluation
An effective evaluation instrument must be included to monitor results both in qualifications gained by students and in the attitudes inculcated in them by the tutor facilitator. These attitudes will include students' hopes, self-actualisation, desires and faith in the future, (that means that the students enjoy learning and want to continue with lifelong learning). The instrument will be looking for the self-actualisation peak of Maslow's pyramid in practice and attitude. Perhaps this means that students may become more like disciples than students. This is because they absorb an ethic of the rightness of their own and other peoples' development through lifelong learning. This evaluation instrument will be the engine that generates the direction future research and development that lifelong learning will take. Some that I have used with this group can be found in the appendices.
2 Customers & Responsibilities
'Those of us who teach bear a greater responsibility' (James the Apostle) . Why? Because we are in the behaviour modification business. What we say, and teach is, usually, uncritically received by most of our students. We sit in the 'god seat'. When we say that the way to do something is like such & such, then, usually, this opinion is accepted as the most correct one. We are also placed in judgement seats. We determine what our students' outcomes will be and sit in judgement on them. We are made prosecutor, judge and jury.
If my students are my customers, then I had better serve them right. If my customer is the institution where I work or a Training & Enterprise Council, then what and how I teach will be determined not by the students but by these bodies. Then the students opinions will not matter so much as the opinion of my customer. For, 'He who pays the piper calls the tune.' Is this the case?. If so, what place integrity? (On the dole queue, I hear some cynic say).
I truly believe that, no matter who pays the piper, the musician must be true to the music and to the ears of the audience. This means that I, the teacher / facilitator must have internalised ethics and values that places the student and the inherent integrity of the subject above mere pecuniary gain. 'Overall, be true to thyself' said a great and ancient philosopher. For, if one practices lying to oneself, then, as practice makes perfect, one may become a perfect liar and lose sight of all that is true, right, and good. One will lose the internal ethic which determines that the student deserves the best that I can be, no matter who is paying me to do it.
3 Content & Ethics
Where do these ethics and values come from? Does the 730 have them built in? Is there some set of rights and wrongs or determining philosophy that we teachers must all adhere to so that we retain our 730 qualification? Or is a 730 for life?
↙ Are there intrinsic values that determine that those who qualify as teachers can, on the whole, be trusted not to exploit their future students for their own ends?
↙ Where are the checks & balances?
↙ Who says what these checks and balances are?
↙ Who polices them?
↙ What sanctions may be applied if trust is broken?
↙ What correctives are in place?
↙ Or is this left to the market?
↙ Is it laissez-faire and all things are laisses-passer by receipt of the 730 certificate?
In answer to some of this, yes, there are ethics to be gained from the works of Maslow, Bloom, Kolb and the like that are required reading for students on the 730. Many of the interpersonal principles learned in the process of 730 training deliver a strong ethical base of care and help for each 730 student teachers' own current and future students. Depending on which organisation one teaches in the checks and balances may vary depending on the internal values of each organisation. They police it and determine what if any sanctions are employed. If this sounds capricious, then, without a national register of approved tutors who are regularly checked out that's the way it is. The market regulates itself.
4 Outcomes, Change & Growth
It is my contention, that, although the 730 appears to be for life, its practitioners can become stale without fresh input and updating of their skills by peers and others. As part of retaining currency for the 730 certificate, practitioners who cannot prove enhancement through further or higher education courses should attend refresher courses every so often. The time scale would have to be determined by heads more experienced and wiser than mine.
Implications for the 730
Is it adequate, sufficient, and of uniform focused quality in everywhere that it is delivered in Britain for it to be acceptable to all further education institutions as a sufficient qualification? Further, are the future students who are to be taught by those who have been 730 certificated getting value for money and time?
An equivalent to the OFSTED (Office For Standards in Education) inspection might be implemented to maintain a high standard that is uniformly quality controlled. Staff in most of the best companies are appraised and, from the appraisal's results' are given learning opportunities to update and enhance their skills. The 730 is a nationally recognised award. 730 qualified tutors should, in my opinion, be made subject to appraisal to a nationally recognised criterion delivered by inspectors culled from 730 and other teacher / learner practitioners. Thus the 730 may, by these means become more a licence to practice than a qualification. A regular form of quality control. A form not dependant upon individual organisations but upon a nationally recognised body that quality controlls its licencees.
These inspectors would be trained to work with 730 tutor / facilitators to help enhance their skills. For the most part, they would be looking for what is right.
They would be on the lookout for best practice that they could take details of and share with the rest of the 730 community. By these means the 730 would be extended and enhanced nationally. As a result, the same high quality delivery could be found from John 'o Groats to Lands End. Where inferior delivery is discovered, then a means for equipping the personnel involved that is in the spirit of a win / win agreement c would be employed. Perhaps a 730 journal might be created, both on paper and via the internet to pool fresh ideas and new paradigms for the further extension and enhancement of the 730.
For this to happen a leader or leaders must appear prepared to take up this vision. Leaders who can influence the 'Peytabees' - the 'Powers That Be' d to agree these principles and cash to fund their implementation. Without such leaders this is just a nice idea. Ideas are powerful. But only ideas adopted are effective. For the future growth and development of the 730 something like this is mandatory. Without it the 730 will grow stale and be superseded by something else. Again, certain leaders will determine what that something else may be. I hope that it is an enhanced 730.
5 Next Steps:- Liberating The Learners
By these means, I believe, the learners, the target audience of the 730 will be liberated. The learners will be liberated because, no matter where their tutor is trained, the same high quality and up-to-date techniques will be currently employed. The learners can be quality assured that what they get is the best that can be. As graduating students of the 730, the learners will know that they haven't reached a plateau. Rather, they will be part of an on going life long learning and quality assured process. While practicing as 730 qualified teachers, all the other 730 qualified teachers will be working with them to ensure that they and what they teach are the best that they can be.
We are what we repeatedly do.
Excellence, then, is not an act,
but a habit - Aristotle
2723 words.
Index
On Extending & Enhancing the 730
MY TEACHING & DELIVERY CONTEXT:- 1
MENTORING, COACHING & INTERDEPENDENCE. 1
METHODOLOGY 2
Purpose, Customers, Content & Outcome 3
1 Purpose ReGenesis? 3
MONITORING 4
MY EXPERIENCE OF MONITORING 4
TAUGHT OR FACILITATED? 4
EFFECTIVE EVALUATION 5
2 Customers & Responsibilities 5
3 Content & Ethics 6
4 Outcomes, Change & Growth 6
IMPLICATIONS FOR THE 730 6
5 Next Steps:- Liberating The Learners 7
Index 8
REFERENCES 9
REFERENCES
Bibliography
S. R. Covey, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People; Simon & Schuster, Toronto; 1990.
J. Daines, C. Daines & B. Graham; Adult Learning & Adult Teaching; Alden Press; 1993. Pgs 29 & 31.
Rene Carayol, Director of IT & IPC magazines; Article in the Guardian, September 16th 1995.
Charles Handy; The Age of Unreason; Hutchinsons Dictionary of Business Quotations, Helicon Publications, 1996.
Glynis Taylor; Taken from course handout 'CURRICULUM MODELS' during Cert.Ed lecture delivered at UCE 4/2/98.
S. R. Covey; Principle Centred Leadership; Simon & Schuster; London; 1992. Pg 270.
Jeff Guest's adaption of research performed by Howard Gardner & colleagues at Harvard University, 'Learning Styles in Communication & the 7 Intelligencies', together with learner self analysis set building materials in Appendix 1 adapted from R. Belbin's work, Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail; Butterworth & Heinman, London; 1981..
Glynis Taylor; Excerpts from course handout, 'Teaching, Careers, Identities, Roles. Experiential Learning' from Cert. Ed Lecture given at UCE 7/1/98
R. Belbin; Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail; Butterworth & Heinman, London; 1981.
edited by Kolb, Rubin & Osland ;The Organisational Behaviour Reader; Prentice-Hall International Inc.; New Jersey; 1991, article, Career Development, Personal Growth, and Experiential Learning Wolfe & Kolb ppg 145 每 174.
Gibbs, S. Habershaw & T Habershaw, 53 Interesting Ways To Appraise Your Teaching, TES Books, Plymouth, 1989.
James Champy, The Re-Engineering Handbook, Harper-Collins, London, 1996, & Reengineering Management, Harper-Collins, London, 1995.
a The criterion of this qualification will be determined by the Training & Development Lead Bodies and will be contained in a beta-document for pilot project purposes. The final details will be determined by the results of pilot schemes performed over the next year in all participating training agencies, management & industry institutes, colleges and universities & in consultation with TDLB's.
b See note a, above.
Ian Reece & Stephen Walker; 'A Practical Guide To Teaching, Training & Learning', 2nd edition; Business Education Publishers. 1994,
compiled by Walter W. Skeet; Dictionary of English Etymology; Wordsworth Reference; London; 1993
Rienecker & Rogers; Linguistic Key the the Greek New Testament; Regency Reference Library; Grand Rapids, Michigan; 1976; pp 731 每 732.
c S. Covey, 'Principle Centred Leadership', Simon & Schuster; London; 1992. pp 44-45; 60, 63.
d Anne McAffrey, 'Powers That Be', Bantam Books, London; 1997.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Beyond Uncertainty; Charles Handy; Hutchinson; London; 1995.
Effective Entrepreneurship; Anderson & Woodcock; Blackwell Business; Oxford; 1996.
Effective Management Through Communication; R. Glanville; Coventry; 1990
Innovation and Entreneurship; P. F. Drucker; Butterworth-Heinmann; Oxford; 1985
Executive EQ: Emotional Intelligence In Business; Cooper & Sawaf, Orion, San Francisco, 1996.
Investing In People; Harley Turnbull; Pymouth; 1996.
International Dimensions of Organisational Behaviour, 3rd ed; Nancy J Adler; International Thomson Publishing; Cincinnati, Ohio; 1997.
In Search Of Excellence; T. Peters & R. H. Waterman jr; Harper 每 Collins; Glasgow; 1982.
Inspirational Management; Sylvia Nash; Moody Press; Chicago; 1992.
Learn How To Study; Derek Rowntree; Warner; London; 1970.
Management in Action & Building Management Teams; Belamy, Newman & Wills; Coventry; 1990.
Managing in turbulent times; P. F. Drucker; Pan; Gateshead, Tyne & Wear; 1980
Management & the Christian Worker;' O. Hendrix; C L C International; Madras, India; 1970
Productivity & Effectiveness Through People; Belamy, Francis, Jopling, Newman & Wills; Coventry; 1990
Perfect Teamwork; Ron Johnson; Arrow; London; 1995.
Riding the Waves of Culture; Fons Trompenaars; Nicholas Brearley; London; 1994.
Reengineering Management; James Champy, Harper-Collins, London, 1995.
The Transforamtion of Management; Mike Davidson; Macmillan Business, London, 1995
The Pursuit of Quality; B. Whitford & R. Bird; Prentice Hall; Hemel Hempstead; 1996.
Word Count: 3518
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